ct06033

Okay so I dont have many photos of the front as I was short on time and had to just get the work done but I completed the front. In the spirit of my first post, I wont give the exact steps since ive seen those everywhere but instead a few pointers and insights in doing this as well as my final impressions of the work.

So as for the cabin floor, As my main goal was to reduce noise from the differential, I only put material behind the cross brace. I dont think the front of the car really needed anything and was mostly correct. I also put the most material down in this portion of the car.

My theory here is most of the noise that was entering the car, comes from this point (i was somewhat wrong on this). so the MLV will block sound from entering the cabin and the thinsulate will reduce echo from within the cabin. As such, neither requires 100% coverage to do the job.

I started with the dampening material CLD. I think most people overdo the transmission tunnel as in most cars, its the source of a lot of noise. On the S2000, not only was it pretty well dampened and solid anyway, I dont feel a lot of noise actually comes through this part of the car. But either way, I put material liberally covering most of the floor pan and rear leading up to the pass through holes to the trunk and stopping there. the rest of the metal is inside the car so no need to put anything there. I also did the back side of the rear quarter plastic and the metal of the door sil. After that comes the really fun (not) part. CCF and MLV. The CCF while light, was a pain to cut as the exacto blade seemed to rip more than cut. Be careful of the seat sensor harness as i clipped mine accidently and had to re-attach it.


This was taken part way through installation of CLD

My method was to lay the foam in, lining up one edge with the outer edge of the car and using a carpenter pencil to outline the cuts. Once the piece is cut out and test fit, it becomes the template for cutting the mlv as that stuff is heavy and not super flexible so on the passenger side, I see many people trying to fit the contours of the tunnel and cutting and layering material. My theory is, its under the seat so nobody will see it, all that extra material is additional weight, and the heat should relax the vinyl and it will contour on its own. The MLV however is easy to cut with a razor blade so the holes and cutouts were very easy to make. once everything is test fit yet again, i used some contact cement to adhere the CCF to the MLV then threw it in. once everything is bolted down, this stuff shouldnt move but I was worried about sagging over time and so velcroed the top part down. Also of note, I had to cut to fit the material around a wire harness that goes on the back wall behind the driver seat. Another note is to make sure and cut out some material near the seatbelt mount as it was a pain in the butt getting that bolt back in with the extra material in the way. Same goes around the seat mounting points.

Next goes in the thinsulate. I used some thinner material here but still almost .75" thick expanded. place in, trace, cut, test fit.I also velcroed the top part to the MLV. After this, you are almost done with everything under the carpet. I see posts where people put mlv or thinsulate against the transmission tunnel and I have to recommend against it. One, for me, it interfered with putting the seats back into the car and two, to reiterate, there is not much noise that comes from this point. I tried MLV on one side and thinsulate on the other both interfered with the seats and I dont think there is a noticable improvement. YMMV. I threw some thinsulate against the outside wall as well and the carpet goes back down. Now, this can be discouraging as the carpet will no longer fit especially around the leather trim for the center console. I just fit it as best I could and made sure the leather pieces were battened down well.


MLV and Thinsulate installed. This was before cutting the various holes for screws.

Speaking of center console, I didnt do too much here. just threw some CLD where it would fit and a piece of thinsulate under the cup holders. Also, while on the topic of the center, the center compartment is A) an absolute pain to remove and b) unnessessary. I ended up just stuffing some scrap thinsulate behind it and called it good.



For the plastic trim pieces, i glued some thinsulate to the rear quarter panel and the piece directly behind the seats. the trim should fit correctly still if a bit snug. I found the rear quarters dont quite sit flush anymore with the rollhoops but they dont rattle or move and its low visibility so.... eh. Then its just putting the seats back in and bolting down. I found the inner rear bolt was no longer long enough to thread in so a quick trip to Ace for some grade 8 bolts, heavy washers and lock washers and that was complete.

So with this, I went for a test drive and around town, its great but I still had a lot of wind/road noise on the highway coming through the top. So taking a page from the thinsulate install post here, i tried to copy this with the leftover thick thinsulate I had. Originally, i tried to cover the entire rear behind the third bar but that proved too difficult so I cut out the middle pieces. I used some epoxy to attach the fabric to the soft top, taking care to tuck behind some of the straps and plastic where possible and making sure you cant see if from the outside. You can see it when you are inside the car but its hardly noticable. I also noticed the top doesnt quite sit as flush when down. Still looks fine but its about half as high as when the elastic straps wear out and the top doesnt seat fully. But the sound difference on the highway is well worth it. No more wind, tire, car, etc noises. Its still louder than say... an Audi but not loud enough that you need to raise your voice. Win in my book. In fact, I think it was the single most effective mod I did so if you are looking to cut down cabin noise but for the least amount of weight, I think doing this and nothing else would go a very long way in terms of noise reduction.

During this time, I also mounted and wired the amp. I made an oem style loom with the 4 speaker wires and ignition wire that hooks into the stereo harness and ran along the passenger side into the rear along with the positive wire from the battery. I just poked a hole in the rubber gromet in the firewall and fed the wire through. Make sure you put the fuse on there! From there, I cut the old carpeted board that covered the spare tire tools and used that as the amp rack. for the amp I am using, it was stiff enough but if you are using a larger amp, MDF is the way to go.

So, all that said and done, was it worth it? In my mind, absolutely. not only is the cabin much quieter, I feel less fatigue, and I can talk to passengers/hear music better so absolutely. Speaking of music, I had to turn the gain for the sub all the way up to match the rest of my speakers I set the cross over to 80hz and it pairs very nicely, adding that last bit of low range to music. The truck does not rattle one bit and the sound quality is superb. I dont have any empirical measurements of improvement but its a night and day difference both to me and others who have ridden with me before and after.